Author: dpugh007

The crown jewel.

Much like the WWE’s actual touring schedule, the WWE 2K series never stops. This lineage of games has been releasing every single year since WWF SmackDown on the original PlayStation in 2000. As a result, each entry has started to become mostly iterative rather than radically different, as all annual sports games eventually become. However, as many wrestling fans know, there are plenty of areas of improvement in this franchise, and thankfully, WWE 2K19 actually manages to address some of these.

When sports games started trending in the direction of trading a regular “season” mode for the MyCareer format, the WWE followed suit. While this proved to work well for the FIFA’s of the world, it didn’t exactly jive with wrestling. Players would play repetitive matches over and over again until they eventually moved up the championship rankings, completely doing away with the over the top story-lines and general wackiness that professional wrestling brings. WWE 2K18 tried to address this, but ultimately it was still more miss than hit. Thankfully, this time around MyCareer mode is something truly worth playing.

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Strikingly boring.

The shoot ‘em up is a bit of a niche choice these days. Long gone are the days where Galaga and Space Invaders were the hottest games on the market. The genre now seems defined by small indie releases via the PlayStation Store. Fast Striker comes courtesy of a German developer, the confusingly named NG:DEV.TEAM. It’s a shmup with a focus on scoring points, trying to emulate the feeling of classic arcade titles. It’s bizarrely been around since 2010, released only for the now defunct Neo Geo and SEGA Dreamcast. The updated version released on the PlayStation Store adds a fourth difficultly level, but seemingly little else.

The four difficultly settings are novice, original, maniac and omake. What’s slightly interesting about each is that they provide different scoring mechanics depending on which you choose. For example, maniac mode offers more points for players who get up close and personal with enemies instead of keeping their distance. If you care for point collection, then this is your kind of game. It’s really the only variable besides reaching the end of the level. There’s the odd secret to collect, but they amount to very little other than yet more points. The difficulty settings do however provide a substantial level of challenge when playing on anything but novice. The game relishes in the old ‘as hard as an 80s arcade’ mantra, so expect to see your little ship explode frequently.

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Smashing pumpkins.

Pull a sheet over your head and stuff your face with sweets: Halloween is almost here. Some of you may be celebrating the holiday by playing some creepy horror games, but we think we’ve found the most apt game for the season. Halloween Forever is a cutesy 8-bit platformer that’s coming to both PS4 and PS Vita tomorrow in select regions (though sadly not Europe).

It stars Pumpkin Head, a pumpkin brought to life by an evil undead sorcerer, and sees you running through various spooky levels shooting candy corn from your carved mouth. It looks pretty fun, and as we said, it’s perfect for getting into the Halloween spirit.

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Daylight robbery.

The Quiet Man continues to sound like a compelling curiosity, as Square Enix has announced that oddball synth-pop singer Imogen Heap has been brought in to compose the console exclusive’s theme song. Speaking as part of the video embedded above, the musician explains that she watched videos of people who’d been fitted with cochlear implants as inspiration for the audio, and she tried to capture the moment of them hearing for the first time.

Narratively, the song will be performed by a character in the game called Lala, who’s the fictional singer that gets kidnapped and sends protagonist Dane on his adventure to rescue her. We’re big fans of Imogen Heap so we’re looking forward to hearing the full song; in the meantime you can hear her thoughts on the project in the clip at the top of the page.

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The stage is set.

In case you missed it, Bandai Namco recently released the first half of a mini documentary looking back at the history of its SoulCalibur series. With SoulCalibur VI on the verge of release, it’s an interesting video that gets you up to speed with the rise and fall of the fighting game’s popularity, particularly within the competitive space. Now, the second part of the documentary is here, and it puts the focus squarely on the new sequel.

Judging by the comments made in this video, those within the competitive scene are pretty excited. Interest seems to be much higher for this entry than usual, due to it being accessible and a little nostalgic while also sprinkling in some new ideas. Reviews so far have been strong, too — we’ll be bringing you our verdict soon.

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Cold day in hell.

Will Diablo IV be announced at BlizzCon 2018? For a while there it was starting to seem more and more likely, with Blizzard dropping hints that the future of its loot-heavy role-playing series would be unveiled at next month’s event, but now the developer’s trying to temper expectations.

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Another one bites the dust.

Wreckfest has broken down and been taken back to Bugbear’s workshop, where it will remain for repairs into 2019. The title – which was due out on 20th November – has been delayed on the PlayStation 4 by THQ Nordic, as the publisher works to get the destructive racer up to scratch on Sony’s system. The PC version got good reviews earlier in the year, so it seems like it’ll be time well spent.

“Wreckfest for consoles will only be released as soon as we love playing it,” said senior producer Roger Joswig. “We are sorry for keeping fans waiting longer because of this. However, we already have compensation in the form of further vehicles, including a special crazy vehicle, in the works for consoles.” How crazy is crazy? We hope it’s kerrr-azy like in Crazy Taxi.

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Coming out on top.

We’ve got a bone to pick with the PlayStation 4 version of Dream Daddy: where’s the exclusive Kratos add-on pack? Game Grumps, the creators of last year’s PC-based dating sensation, could have at least given us Joel from The Last of Us – heck, we’d have settled for Days Gone’s Deacon St John, but with a name like that only if we were really desperate.

Alas, the Dadrector’s Cut – there’s an “uncut” pun in here which is too lewd for even us – will add new side-quests and minigames. And for those of you who have somehow never heard of it, this is a dating game where you, y’know, try to bag a big beefcake Dad. Because who doesn’t want a bear in the bedroom? No, we don’t mean a real one, we mean…

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New New Vegas.

Veteran role-playing game developer Obsidian Entertainment is “very doubtful” that it’ll make another Fallout game. The studio was responsible for Fallout: New Vegas, a game that’s still considered by many to be a high point of the series. Ever since its release in 2010, fans have been asking Obsidian whether it would ever consider returning to the franchise, and although the developer’s never been able to give a concrete answer, it’s always seemed an unlikely scenario.

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Be prepared.

In case you hadn’t noticed, Red Dead Redemption 2, probably the biggest game of the year, is out in just over a week’s time. The highly anticipated sequel is racing towards us on horseback, and we can’t wait to get stuck in. However, the game’s giant file size has been well documented, so you’ll want to get downloading it as soon as you can, right?

Well, good news: Rockstar has confirmed that pre-loading of its open world Western will become available on 19th October – that’s this Friday.

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